Protect Defend Respect
by evening spirit
Summary: It's the end of the world as we know it. Future fic, S1 canon compliant. Then I went wild...
1. Prologue

**Summary:** It's the end of the world as we know it.

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**Protect. Defend. Respect.**

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**Prologue**

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Amidst all the chaos that erupted after the Hydra reveal, the Earth lost its Shield.

Literally. When aliens returned to claim our planet as their own, humanity was defenseless. Even the Avengers could only do so much. In the end, after months of fighting in the frontlines, after losing battle after battle, city after city, continent after continent, they had to withdraw. Presumably they formed an underground resistance in some forsaken part of the world. They are regaining their strength, rebuilding their army. Searching for people brave enough and determined enough to put their lives on the line to save humanity.

At least that's the gossip.

If there are other resistance cells, larger or smaller, they are scattered and so deep in hiding, nobody knows about them. Not even their allies. But if they all organized, if they all came together... then maybe we would have a chance at defeating the aliens.

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t.b.c.


	2. Playground

**A/N:** Future Fic, compliant with season one canon. After that I went wild... Alien invasion, apocalypse, what have you...

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**Playground**

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_"I don't remember what it's like to care enough about life that the thought of death could destroy me"  
_**~ Colleen Hoover, _Losing Hope_**

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It'd been ten months, fifteen days, six hours and about fifteen minutes since the invasion. Four months, eight days and twenty hours plus-minus a few minutes since the total surrender. Fitz would know the exact numbers. He reminded Jemma often enough, though, that she started counting herself. On that day, over four months ago, the remaining rulers of most countries that still had presidents or kings, or first secretaries – all of them on refuge in Australia – had signed the capitulation of Earth to the blue-skinned Kree warriors. New order was established, as foreign as the language the aliens spoke. New mysterious factions ruled the Earth, highest casts of the invaders shared regions and spheres of influence, new leaders of armies were appointed and religions were turned over.

Humans were not included in any decision-making circles. Humans had become, without exception, slaves. Working to feed their masters, to satisfy their desires, to provide subjects for experiments. It turned out that human blood mixed with that of a Kree, allowed the Kree to become stronger, almost superpowered. It worked in the opposite direction too, actually, only no Kree would allow human to take some of their blood.

Jemma Simmons however, had some of that in her hands. Jemma... and Raina. Or more to the point Jemma had it thanks to Raina. Which wasn't fun at all, but considering their circumstances, Coulson's team had to make an alliance with the most unlikely people in the world – Raina NoLastName and Ian Quinn. The latter, however, had died not long after the capitulation.

Seven of them, plus LMD Billy Koenig and Grant Ward, lived the past half a year – more-or-less – in the Playground base, deep under the mountains of Alaska. So far, undetected by the Kree, some of them more content with their tentative safety, others itching to move out.

"We should totally check that signal from Mexico," Skye got on her tangent at breakfast. Two weeks ago she and Fitz had discovered a brief interrupted message that would come up every three hours, twenty minutes and six seconds. It seemed to be in Morse Code but it didn't form any words that made sense. Still, she was convinced it was sent by humans and that it was a code within a code.

"I said I ran it through seven hundred and fifteen permutations of five thousand, two hundred and fifty six algorithms," Fitz recited in his emotionless voice.

"It's not about deciphering it. She means we should check it out." Triplett backed up Skye. He always did.

"You mean go out?" asked May, freezing him with her stare. "Half cooked?"

"I understand that you're restless," Coulson, as usual, tried to placate them all. "But we're safe here."

"For how long?" asked Raina with that charming smile of hers. "We are tempting fate as it is and you know that, Coulson. They may detect us any moment. We would be better off on the move."

Coulson returned her smile. Over the months they worked up a strange variety of a relationship otherwise known as mutual respect. They gazed at each other for a few heart beats, until he said.

"But we don't really have much fuel."

Raina nodded with a chuckle.

May snorted, Triplett sighed, Skye stuck her fork into the gray mass that was supposed to be tofu burger. Fitz stared above Jemma's arm, his eyes dancing only a little, as usual in the morning when he was rested, with an expression on his face that only she understood as a weird mix of resignation and trust.

Ward sat silent as ever and to the side.

For a moment the team ate in a relative quiet. Skye muttered something to Trip, drawing lines in her burger. He nodded vigorously. Coulson eyed them with worry and May with annoyance.

"How many vials of the drug do we have?" Raina leaned to Jemma, although Jemma suspected the gifted medic knew better than she did.

"Three," she lied, looking at the woman out of the corner of her eye.

"I thought we didn't manage to completely fill the last one." Sure enough, Jemma was right.

When she couldn't help a triumphant smirk, Raina only nodded in an 'a-ha' gesture, understanding she had been caught. Then she smiled a tight lipped smile. "Coulson still wants to try it on the team?" she asked. "Despite what it did to Garrett?"

"We don't have any viable way to verify which people are Kree descendants from the invasion from ten thousand years ago, and which don't have enough Kree genes in them to withstand the effects of their blood. We may only test it by trial-and-error."

"And kill our people?"

Jemma turned to her unasked for lab partner with venom. This team was not Raina's people, not in Jemma's eyes, ever.

"That. Or you might tell us how you knew Skye was special."

"I already told you all I knew." Which, as far as Jemma could tell, gave them nothing. "All I can say is that I don't see this in any of you."

Jemma had enough of this conversation. She wasn't hungry anymore either.

"Excuse me." She didn't forget to be polite but the way she abruptly stood up, made even Coulson furrow his brow at her. She ignored him, ignored May's questioning stare, grabbed her plate and strode to the recycler.

She didn't notice that Ward stood up a moment before her and was just emptying his plate above the bin that would convert their unfinished burgers into freshly cooked burgers for dinner. She sighed but neared him. It was better than going back to the table.

They haven't talked much, none of them talked much to Ward and he didn't ever initiate contact. He sat to the side at meals, did what he was told, didn't attempt to get anywhere near any weapons. He was watched at all times either by May or by Triplett. They would never trust him again. At least he wasn't locked up in a cage anymore.

"You should eat more," Jemma barked at him.

Ward turned to her and looked pointedly at her plate.

"So should you," he whispered. He couldn't speak, never would again and Jemma was glad for it.

"I'm not the one who looks like death warmed over," she spat, not out of friendly concern. She was the only thing resembling a doctor their team had and it was her professional duty to mind their physical state. Ward lost a lot of weight. They all did, living on hunger rations for months now, their skin grayish from luck of sun and fresh air. He seemed to take it the worst though, at least on the outside. Jemma had no idea what was going on inside that messed up head of his and she didn't even want to know.

She threw her plate on the counter next to the bin, food still on it – let the rat clean up after her – and she strode out of the dining area.

She was allowed the luxury of solitude for only a few minutes, when someone knocked on the door to the room she shared with Skye.

"Enter," she spat and hoped it was someone she didn't hate at the moment.

It was Fitz.

"Saw you upset," he started. Didn't quite enter the room, stood in the doorway, hesitant, glaring at the corner high under the ceiling.

She hated that in him, this insecurity, uncertainty. Damn, she hated everyone for that matter. What was wrong with her? And it wasn't just her, they were all arguing more and more, about silly stuff. Skye barely slept in their room these days, because Jemma kept nagging her about clothes left in places she found offensive. Not earlier than yesterday she had blown up at May for being late for her blood test. May had only given her a sad glance and extended her hand. The truth was Jemma was mad, because they were running out of everything, reagents, medications, even damn vials and needles. She could see they were all slowly withering, dying and she couldn't do anything about it.

"We should do as Skye sais. Maybe?" Fitz didn't move an inch but his eyes were doing their crazy dance now, a clear sign that he was upset. He probably couldn't see a thing because of that.

Jemma wiped a tear from her cheek, stood up and neared him

"I don't know." She took his hand in both hers and stood like this, holding his spastic fingers curled into a fist, for a few heart beats.

"We're losing hope." Her once best friend, man she considered the other half of herself, tried to focus on her face and ended up looking entirely to the side. It hurt, it still pained her like a stab to the heart, to see him like this. Which was why she hardly ever spoke to him now. She had lost hope a long time ago. Obviously he hadn't, though. "I spoke to Coulson yesterday in the afternoon. An hour and twelve minutes after he finished dinner. I finished earlier, but..."

"Fitz," Jemma interrupted. "What did you talk about?" She led him to the couch and helped him sit down while he continued.

"Coulson thinks we are the only ones left in the world. The only people who are not imprisoned in some way by the occupant. He believes no Avengers is left alive at this point. I don't believe that, because there were at least a hundred people on the Index before Skye deleted the data. I don't know the exact number..."

"Fitz. It's not important. Coulson."

"Coulson believes we are the only ones." He focused very, very hard. "I don't. He used to ask me to look out for signals. He doesn't anymore. I found that signal. Skye thinks it's important and I agree with her. Coulson says it's a natural phenomenon or a Kree transmission and that's why we can't decipher it." He put his other hand over hers and squeezed it so tight, her fingers begun to go numb. She didn't take it away, though.

"So why bother with it?" she asked instead.

"Because we gotta do something. That's what Trip says. When were we last outside? Two months, five days and seven hours ago we closed the gate never to open it again. Before that, we were at least raiding towns here and there for supplies. For two months, five days and seven hours we do nothing. Notice that I didn't tell you the minutes."

"Yes, that is a progress," Jemma thought it should be a joke, but it wasn't funny. Her hand was still in Fitz's claw-like grip.

"I don't care." Fitz nodded several times. "We have to do something. Otherwise we're as good as dead already."

"What do you want me to do? It's not like I'm Coulson and I can order the team to do anything."

"Yes, but having you on our side, means it's only Coulson and May against it. If there was a vote, I mean. But maybe there will be. Skye is working on having Coulson put the question under a debate. After all, we're not really a military-like unit, if there's no military in the world anymore."

He was right. They were as far removed from the military as they could be. Each of them was doing their own thing, Fitz and Skye combing through radio waves and talking in numbers rather than words; Trip cleaning the weapons and cataloguing their ammo over and over again, sometimes with May, sometimes without her. Sometimes they were sparring. May was often leaving the base through exits only known to her, to the outside where no one would dare to follow. Coulson spent his time locked up in his room nowadays, only coming out for meals, in always faultlessly ironed suits. No one knew what he was doing inside, though. Maybe May, but she wouldn't tell. Jemma was usually locked up in her lab, pretending that she relished in Raina's company, that she profited from the other woman's knowledge.

Fitz was right. They were as good as dead.

If they left the base, if they moved out, they might die for real. But at least, on their way to their deaths – they would have a purpose.

"Okay," Jemma sighed and, strangely enough, she felt like she could breathe for the first time in months.

* * *

t.b.c.

No character bashing in comments, please.


	3. Threshold

**A/N: **I really don't know what I'm doing with this story... head!desk Maybe I should just let it wait for better times?

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**Threshold**

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Melinda May still sneaked out of the base at least twice in a week. Sitting crammed inside was too hard for her, watching her teammates fade away, watching Coulson... He was a faint shadow of the vibrant, confident, funny leader he used to be. These days she smiled more often than he did, which was saying something.

He still tried to keep up a brave face for the team, dressed up every morning, came to the dining area, asked them questions about their fields of work. Simmons's and Raina's lab research, Skye's progress at cracking the code of Kree computer-like station stolen from the shot-down aircraft they had found before the capitulation, Fitz's ideas about how the aircraft was operated, or if he found any new frequencies worthy their attention. He would review defense plans with her and Triplett every once in a while.

When he came back to their room though, it was like someone flipped a switch and turned him off. He would sit in an armchair and glare at the wall for hours. Until it was time to sleep, or until someone called him. He only got out of the room when he knew someone needed to talk to him, ask him about something, require his presence or opinion.

May stopped asking. At first she had tried to pull him out of this stupor with lesser and lesser effect. At the beginning, when they first got here, things had been different. It had been Phil who had started this - this thing between them. He had kissed her. Held her after the Avengers had lost the battle of Lima. From there it had been the downfall of the war but that battle had also marked a slight upward trend in their operations. The war had moved to the Earth's southern hemisphere, so they had some courage to get out more, to even fly out and attack outposts all over Northern America. They had wanted the Avengers to know there had been someone else fighting.

No one had come to aid them, though. They had lost the jet and the bus had also received a crippling blow. They had been extremely lucky they had all survived. It had been the first time they let Ward out of the cage and had trusted him to fly the plane. He had proven useful, had shown they had done the right thing when they hadn't killed him way back, when the worst enemy they could imagine were Hydra traitors.

That was before the Invasion, before the initial strike that killed three billion people. When life had actually been much simpler.

Melinda stopped and took a deep breath. She was about to fall into her own memory trap again. She would go back and back through the better times, trying to relive them, even the painful ones, as if that would make reality less true. It wouldn't though. It would only make going back home, to the base, that much harder.

She had to stop. She had to turn around, shake off the snow from her coat, and trek back through the wilderness. She walked far this time. The frozen lake in the valley below was beyond the paper maps they had in the bunker.

It took her until the evening to return to Playground. The automatic weapon outside stopped working shortly after Kree shortwired all earthly electronics. The heavy blast doors wouldn't open without operating systems. The bunker had emergency entrance down the side of the mountain.

When May entered the narrow corridor leading from the entrance to the heart of their hideout, she saw Ward, getting ready to go out. It was strange, she thought she was the only one who still ventured outside. She wouldn't ask him about it though. She knew, someone must have ordered him to go, he wouldn't have any ideas of his own.

"You're back," she heard him breathe out, as she passed him by.

She spun to face him as if he smacked her, although hearing his voice, or rather his whisper, made her more surprised than angry. He lowered his gaze. "Coulson told me to search for you," he explained and she had to strain her ears to hear it. "Trip's coming too. He's gone to get weapons."

Melinda nodded. She was about to walk away without a word, but stopped. Looked back at the man she had once considered a friend, then, briefly, a threat. Now he was like a dog, she could kick him and he would lick her boots.

Instead of submission she expected to see in his face, though, she saw genuine relief and thankfulness. He nodded and walked away before she gave her permission.

"There you are!" she heard another voice, loud, vibrant, with a heavy accent and a smile still ringing between the vocals. Triplett managed to retain some of his innocence despite everything that had happened to them. He stood before her now, beaming. "And here we thought you got lost."

"You were going to go out to find me." Melinda returned his smile. She couldn't not. "With Ward?"

"He doesn't bite, you know."

"I know you think he doesn't bite."

She passed him and walked deeper into the tunnels, taking off her gloves, her cap and unzipping her coat. Triplett fell into step beside her.

"The team is waiting for you," he announced in a mysterious tone.

"Did something happen?"

"Nothing happened. We have a decision to make." He beamed again and May thought that he was actually more chipper than usual. "Go get unbuttoned and we'll meet you in the lounge in five. I'll let the others know you're back."

She didn't wait five minutes. Stepped into her room only to leave her clothes there – Coulson wasn't in – and proceeded straight to the lounge. Nobody yet came.

The first to arrive was Ward. May didn't speak to him and he acknowledged her with a small nod and took a seat in the back of the room. Soon after came Raina, looked at Ward, looked at May, pointedly, pursed her lips, folded her hands on her chest and walked straight to the armchair in the center of the room.

Skye came with Fitz, his left hand gripping her elbow like a lifeline, his right, damaged one waving madly. He kept spurting words like they had meaning. And they probably had, Skye seemed to understand his vocal avalanche, because she nodded and even interrupted at moments. She had to force him to sit down though. He was so excited he wouldn't stay still for a minute. When Triplet came with Jemma in tow, Skye sent him a pleading glance and the specialist squeezed Jemma's arm and took a seat on the opposite side of Fitz. He took Fitz's hand in his and spoke a few words under his breath and the engineer relaxed a little. Jemma wouldn't move from the spot near the door. Phil came in last.

"I see everyone's here," he announced. "And I hear we have a mutiny on our hands." Despite the meaning of his words, he smiled. It was a sad smile but a smile nonetheless. "Skye, would you tell everyone what this is about."

Skye stood up.

"Yes." She scratched the back of her neck, suddenly abashed. "The thing is, some of us talked and we really think it would be wise to leave the Playground and try to... Find out if there really is no one else out there. Because we think there is someone else. And that maybe they think there is no one else too and we should just, you know, let them know that we are here, at least."

Coulson looked at each of them in turn.

"And you all think that?" he asked after a stretch of silence, the sad smile still present on his lips.

"Yes, we do." Antoine Triplett straightened up and looked defiantly at the man he still, for all intents and purposes, considered his commander.

"Yes." Fitz raised his hand and started babbling again. "Because in the signal, I can with some certainty find a pattern that..."

"Fitz." Skye plopped down on the couch, pulled his hand down and pressed her own palm to his chest, preventing him from getting up in excitement. "Not now."

"Not now, okay, not now," Fitz muttered and continued his tirade with only the movement of his lips, his eyes jumping from person to person, to items in the room, unseeing.

When Coulson's eyes fell on May, she read a silent question in them, "You too?"

She had to answer.

"I do not agree with their assertion." It was cold calculation speaking. "If we go out, we'll likely be dead within a few weeks."

Jemma and Raina replied to that at the same time.

"So what?" said Jemma and,

"We wouldn't," assured Raina.

May wasn't sure which one of them to respond to first. She worried for Jemma for months. For a year almost, ever since her and Fitz's near-death experience in the sunk med-pod. Fitz's damage may have been physical and visible to all but Jemma was damaged too and in a more dangerous way, because her pain was invisible. Melinda May knew all about invisible wounds.

Jemma's response threw May off Raina's scent and the clever medic didn't waste any second.

"We won't be dead, if we are truly determined, if we truly believe that we can make it. And we do, I know we do." Her faith and resolve were inspiring and a little contagious. May tried not to trust this woman, but she had a way to warm their hearts. Skye nodded at her words, Triplett was also on her side. "Besides that, we have our secret weapon. If we were only not afraid to use it." She meant the vials with GH-325 serum she and Jemma managed to extract from Skye's and Coulson's blood.

"That is not under consideration," Coulson replied in a voice that could make hell freeze over. He would never allow any more people undergo the treatment with this mixture. He let the two women extract it only for the purpose of scientific research.

When Raina gracefully backed away from her attempt at forcing his hand, Coulson turned to Jemma. He looked at her pointedly, with the same worry May felt.

"So what?" he repeated her statement.

The sadness of Jemma's smile matched his.

"So what if we die within a few weeks. At least we'll be alive. What's the point hiding here if we're the only ones left? It's not like we'll have babies and rebuild the human race. Let's die heroically and maybe we'll manage to at least take a few of them with us."

Melinda didn't like her sense of humor but it seemed to affect Coulson. His smile widened and he nodded.

"Looks like we're outvoted." He looked at May and shrugged. "Let's start packing then."

There was a movement in the corner of the room. Ward stood up and raised his hand to signal he wanted to speak. He could only whisper, so he wouldn't be heard unless they were all silent but he never ever tried to speak anyway. Now, May felt her blood boil at the thought he had some opinion one way or another. As far as she was concerned, he had no right to speak. Coulson, of course, acknowledged his demand.

"Yes," he said. "There's one more thing we need to decide. Ward." His face hardened. "Should we take him with us? Because if we do, we can no longer treat him as a prisoner. We can't afford to watch him and be on the lookout for all the other dangers. We will have to trust him not to stab us in the backs again, allow him to carry weapons. Depend on him to defend us if need be." He was looking at Ward more than at the team, during this speech. As if he expected Ward to promise he would be the good boy from now on. As if it would matter what Ward said.

Melinda was tempted to say she didn't want him to come with them. They didn't need him, they had her and Triplett and Skye was a pretty damn good field agent by now. Jemma learned a lot field skills too. But the truth was, one more gun would only increase their chances at survival. She knew Ward would betray them for the aliens. It was more a matter of principle. She would never consider him a friend again.

She had no idea what others thought, but nobody said anything for a very long time.

"Do you think we should leave him alone, then, here in the base?" Coulson asked eventually.

May was looking at Ward when Coulson spoke and she saw him flinch at those words, a barely perceptible square of his shoulders, a minute grimace. Blink and you miss it. That pang she felt in the pit of her stomach was her suddenly feeling sorry for him. Being left completely alone, abandoned, that would be worse than hell. May gritted her teeth. She didn't want to empathize with Ward.

"I don't think we could..." Jemma started very, very quietly but she wasn't able to finish the sentence.

"We can't," said Fitz. "Can't just leave someone to die." After that he sank into the back of the couch and pursed his lips.

"A vote?" asked Coulson. "Who is for us taking Ward with us? Remember it means we'll have to allow him to carry a weapon."

Fitz's hand shot up first, Jemma was more reluctant to follow. Coulson raised his hand as well, so did Trip and Skye, who kept her eyes trained on Fitz. No one turned to look at Ward, only May did.

And he stood there, motionless, staring at the floor between his feet and the team. As if waiting for a firing squad, resigned.

May lifted her hand too.

In the end it was only Raina who was against taking Ward with them. No surprise really, as the only thing he had ever said without a prompt – and repeatedly at that – was not to trust her.

As the team was leaving the room, Ward approached Coulson and tapped his shoulder. Phil turned to him, eyes hard and May walked to them, just in case. Ward waited for the others to exit and close the door.

"It's not what I wanted to say," he whispered, glaring at Coulson. He opened his mouth and closed them, weighing words. "We shouldn't leave," he finally uttered.

"The decision has been made," May stated curtly. She hated that they shared an opinion.

Ward lifted both his palms. "Hear me out, please." He waited for their confirmation and Coulson folded his arms on his chest and nodded. May sighed and nodded too but remained in a loosened position. Ward took a deep breath. "Okay. I don't think it's good for us to stay here but if we just up and go now, we'll be moving out into an unknown territory. We should probably gather some intel first."

"I have intel," May cut in, louder than she needed to. She could outshout him with anything. "What do you think I was doing outside?"

"That's good. But there's another thing. It's Raina who keeps pushing you outside, are you even aware of that?" In his excitement he let his voice up and the sound of his battered vocal chords actually vibrating, startled them all. Him probably the most and with it came pain. Ward started coughing, clutching his throat. Coulson extended his hand and touched his shoulder, his instinct of a protector winning him over. Ward waved him off, steadied his breathing. "Don't... trust her," he forced out between coughing fits and was unable to say anything more.

May wanted to reply that she trusted Raina more than she would ever trust Ward but Coulson spoke first, gripping Ward's shoulder.

"I don't trust her. Never have. I want you to keep an extra eye on her, would you?" He received a nod from Ward, then turned to May. "You too. Melinda," he grabbed her shoulder as well, "we'll get through this. We'll find the Avengers. And we will win Earth back." He assured in a way she never expected to see again.

And, if anything, it frightened her more than all the disasters before. Here, they stood, the two of them and the traitor and Coulson believed in the impossible. Melinda thought that he had finally lost his mind.

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t.b.c.


End file.
